Depending on the requirements, we might be photographing street scenes, landscapes, or animals. We have access to plenty of those, luckily. One of the hardest things for any hobby photographer to master is the ability to “see” a shot. All too often we’ll arrive at what I consider to be an ideal destination only for the learner to look around in dismay. But this is key – you have to be able to look for and identify interesting shots in pretty much any environment. That’s how us photographers earn our money (unless we entirely confine ourselves to a studio, but even then we need to be able to build a set) and crafting a well-balanced and interesting image can be far harder than most people realise. I’m a great believer in learning from the ground up, be that the technical side or the creative side of photography. If you can understand the basic rules then you have a framework upon which you can lay down your own vision and personal style. I set my learners basic tasks, after relevant instruction. Over time, the tasks naturally become more demanding and are carried out on the day and afterwards as homework. Any outing can last anything from two or three hours to a whole day, depending on where we go, and what we want to achieve. Depending on who the trainee is, I might set the challenge of creating what they consider to be 30 acceptable photographs. What is acceptable or not will depend on their level of course – if the photographer is a beginner then they may be asked to produce a dozen pictures demonstrating that they have understood the concept being delivered. There is absolutely no point learning by rote – you will only learn by doing, and by practising – often.

And so we took a drive along the West Sussex coast today, calling in at Bognor Regis and Littlehampton. I think both of these towns are absolutely great for taking pictures – you’ll find people, sea, buildings, boats, birds …. there are plenty of things to photograph. But the ability to visualise shots can only be achieved through considerable practice and the best advice I can give to any keen hobby photographer is to keep on taking pictures, keep on learning, and gradually piece the elements together in your own time. As Cartier Bresson said, the first 10,000 pictures are the worst.

Being England, the weather was fairly variable. One moment the sky would be bright and sunny and the next moment dark and ominous. We often find ourselves photographing outdoors in the middle of the day in harsh sunshine – I always laugh when I hear advice to avoid those hours. That’s hardly practical, and it’s far from fun. It’s better to try to learn how to work with your environment rather than give up, or expect only to venture out when the weather and the time of day suits you. Take the latter approach, and you’ll spend an awful lot of your time indoors. Today was in part very harsh and glaring – under these conditions I tend to just run with it and I’ll overexpose a little and create fairly high key images which suit the conditions. All too often images taken in the midday sun will look blueish in hue and will be fairly muddy. This is because most hobby photographers will leave their camera in Auto mode and will rely on auto white balance and automatic exposure modes. That might work some of the time, if you’re lucky, but you’ll only get consistently good pictures if you take control. When outside I mostly leave my camera set to Daylight white balance since this will be perfectly acceptable at most times of the day, though in the middle hours I tend to warm things up a little. With exposure you need to recognise that very bright scenes (or metering from a very bright area) will likely cause your camera to underexpose the shot a little (since your camera’s built in light meter is programmed towards a mid grey exposure value) so it’s important to add a bit of positive exposure compensation if you’re scene is very bright (and do the opposite if your scene is mostly dark).

Understanding light is of course an absolute requirement for any image to be truly successful – if you learn how light behaves and how your cameras meter is likely to react, then you should be able to overcome most of the problems you encounter.

Vital to any photograph is the processing stage. Whether you shoot film or digital some adjustment does usually need to be made during the development phase, no matter how carefully you have crafted the picture. The vast majority of photographs, be they RAW or JPEG will require a little bit of boosting or a small amount of colour correction. These changes are often very subtle, but the make all the difference.

Lastly, since I asked this quite often,  as usual I was using my OMD and the little 14-42 pancake zoom.

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The Wey Navigations are perfect for walking – water by its very nature is relaxing and therapeutic to look at, and the pathway along the river is quiet and tranquil. In fact it’s so pleasant that it’s easy to forget how far you’ve walked, and after finding ourselves some distance west of Dapdune Walk we realised we’d walked for a few miles and had no alternative but to walk the same number of miles back again. But what an interesting walk it was, with a mixture of both modern and historic architecture to enjoy. As is often the case I had a small camera with me, the EM5, with which to document my journey. I try to do this as much as possible – I’m fortunate to have friends all over the world and I get to see pictures of their locality quite often, which I love. And I know they will enjoy seeing the things I see whenever I’m out and about.

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I have to say I make a point of avoiding anything resembling a cliff walk, so parts of the South Downs Way (which stretch for some distance close to the edge of the cliff) are beyond comprehension for someone who suffers vertigo on the first rung of a stepladder. Whenever I’ve visited this locality there is one particular feature which always sticks out in my mind – and that is the tendency of human beings walking the topmost Trail to turn off the path and head right to the edge of the cliffs – and then they stand there, barely a metre from a precipitous drop of several hundred feet, where they calmly stare out to sea. In fact if you look closely at a couple of the pictures below, you’ll see some human specks on the cliff edge – eeek (a good time to put the dog back on its lead). Those of you who are local to the area will know that one particular cliff, called Beachy Head, is a very famous spot for suicides – quite a lot of people throw themselves over the edge each year. I’ve even seen wrecked cars at the bottom. This has become such a problem that any individual innocently contemplating the view might be mistaken for a “jumper” and approached by a well-meaning member of the public hoping to thwart them from their end. I remember once taking a boat trip around the coast with a friend and when we looked up to some of the highest cliffs towering above us, we saw two people calmly sitting on the edge, with their legs dangling into the void. My palms are sweating at the thought.

Anyway, a couple of weeks ago the weather started to warm up here in the UK (finally) and we’ve actually had a few days of sunshine (pretty much the only sunshine we’ve had all year) and this has brought the inhabitants of our island out in droves. Parking is always an issue on this side of the pond so any excursion (if it’s to be as pain-free as possible) merits a fairly early start. As is often the case I had an informal trainee with me. The first thing to note about this outing is that we didn’t really get going on the trail until noon. Yes, a photo walk at noon, with glaringly white chalk cliffs all around us. To say the light was glaring, and harsh, is an understatement. So why didn’t we just wait until dawn or dusk to do this? Well, there are three reasons for that. Firstly I don’t have much familiarity with dawn, and dusk can be inconvenient given how my schedule often works out, and thirdly you have to bear in mind that clients are rarely able to fit in with the times of the day when the light is at its best, which is of course around dawn and dusk. So essentially we need to be able to cope with the worst possible conditions. Yes, I would dearly have loved some lovely warm light and long graphic shadows to play with, but it was not to be. So, when photographing in harsh midday sun (with a bit of sea mist thrown in to make your pictures even more washed out) there are certain things you will need to do. Being in control of your exposure is of course paramount, most likely your camera’s inbuilt light meter will read a very bright scene as being too bright, and your camera will naturally try to knock the exposure down a little. For this reason I added a small amount of exposure compensation today. But whatever you do, you need to make sure that you don’t clip (burn out) any bright highlights. Conditions like this will also tend to wash much of the colour out of your images, so overall when you download your pictures they are likely to look a bit dull. Careful processing is quite important when shooting on days like today – you will likely need to add some contrast and a bit of saturation, and some brightness. But as with many photography “rules” the mantra that you should only venture out during the golden hours is often wholly impractical and I would advise anyone to just get out and take pictures whenever they can – don’t be put off by the weather, or the position of the sun. Instead, learn to work with the constraints you find – it’ll make you a better photographer.

As always, I like to travel light whenever I can. I had my OMD and most of these images were captured with the cheap but excellent Olympus 40 to 150 R (a longish zoom lens meant I didn’t have to venture anywhere near the edge of the cliffs). The dynamic range of the OMD’s sensor is pretty special – it’s hard to blow the highlights (I wish that were the case with some of my Canon DSLRs) and the shadows hold plenty of detail.

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So there you have it, there is a need for a quick getaway at times. Fortunately I live in a locality where complete peace and quiet is 5 min away. I live at the foot of the South Downs, West Sussex and if I jump into my car and drive due south I’ll find myself on a tiny narrow winding road which climbs steeply to the top of this particular range of hills. As I drive I feel the air getting colder and my ears start to pop from the altitude. At the top, there’s a small parking area and the South Downs Way runs east to west for a huge distance across neighbouring counties. It can be cold and windy out there but if you’re looking for space and isolation then it’s perfect. You have no hope of finding any signs of habitation for several miles (unless you were to treck back down the way you’d come) and which ever way you cast your eyes you will see nothing but beautiful chalk downland, rolling fields, the odd herd of sheep and cattle, and if you look south just a few miles away you will see the English Channel and on a clear day the Isle of Wight. As you walk either East or West you may spot another human being , usually mountain bikers, long distance runners, or dog walkers . But be prepared to be alone and take the usual precautions.

We have just enjoyed two days of acceptably mild weather here in the UK, a direct contrast to 6 months of arctic temperatures and almost relentless heavy snowfall. And the sun was shining, so it seemed a perfect evening to walk a couple of miles right at the top of the Downs. It would be silly not to take a camera.

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There have been other consequences to the freezing months – the flowers we normally see in early spring were unable to develop, the buds which normally bring new life to our trees and shrubs have been totally absent. Our birds have not been singing and overall the scene has been very bleak. But the last few days have seen an improvement and finally some flowers have appeared in my garden – and some of my birds have been gathering nesting materials (although they’re not really singing much, so I’m not sure how that bodes in terms of finding a mate). Everything is terribly late, but at least something is starting to appear. Of course on this side of the pond if we’re not having freezing snow then milder weather is almost always accompanied by heavy rain and consequently the devastating floods we’ve seen in recent years. And yes, we have heavy rain forecast for the weekend. Let’s hope the water levels remain manageable. But for now, I was able to walk across my squelching waterlogged back garden to pick a couple of flowers for my office. And since I’m so pleased to see them, they had to be photographed.

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As always when I visit somewhere interesting I had a camera of some sort with me – the kit I use is a question I’m asked pretty much every day (even though a camera is simply recording device and has very little bearing on the image creation process) but for the record I had my OMD with a pancake wide to tele zoom. Like most of  my personal photography, I shot these as JPEGs.  The OMD’s sensor is incredibly effective at controlling highlight clipping so I’m more than happy to shoot JPEG even in quite contrasty conditions.

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With all that in mind I drove to Guildford, Surrey today. It’s a pleasant drive consisting of nothing but leafy country lanes and roads, green fields and streams, punctuated by occasional quaint English villages. I live in quite a rural environment, in a small village in West Sussex in the south of England, so going to a large town or city involves a bit of travel. Guildford is about 50 min North West and Brighton is about 40 min East of my home. Both are completely different, Brighton is known for its seaside, the arts, decadence, nightlife and fine Regency architecture whereas Guildford is a refined and affluent market town with a collection of ancient, Victorian, Edwardian and Georgian buildings and homes, and the usual streets of designer boutiques. Following my wander around the shops I decided to document my walk back to the car, which is always left next to the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre by the river. The images may seem mundane to many, but I know that my friends in the States, Australia, Japan, Canada and many other parts will probably enjoy seeing how we live just as much as I enjoy seeing the sights they encounter themselves each day.

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Model Jennifer Dickinson was an all-round star, totally unfazed by the subzero temperatures which are prevailing here in the UK. As you can see there are immediate benefits to building your portfolio with a professional model since their tolerance level is generally vastly higher than that of a friend or paying customer who may not be quite so open to spending several hours at a time in the freezing cold! Obviously the comfort of your model is paramount so make sure that hot water bottles or warm coats are close at hand.

As is the case these days I normally travel light (photography is tiring physically and mentally and there is nothing worse than suffering aches and pains, or even injury, from carrying around large heavy DSLR bodies and lenses) and my constant companions over the weekend were my Olympus OMD and Fuji X100 (X100 for the top three images, useful for when I need a wider field of view). The u4/3 35-100 f2.8 lens is certainly proving itself as far as my portraiture work is concerned. I originate from the days when small cameras and rangefinders were the norm in professional circles and I have no reservations whatsoever in using today’s modern equivalents as my professional tools of choice. Lighting came courtesy of Elinchrom Quadra Rangers. Photographing Jennie was a real pleasure and I have a feeling I’ll be seeing her again.

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And so I found myself at my friend and fellow photographer Derek Pether’s studio in Hampshire in sub zero temperatures over a weekend here in the UK. But the weather did absolutely nothing to affect the spirits of the small tight group who had been fortunate enough to gain a place on this very special workshop. Before I go on, Derek’s studio is absolutely lovely and is available to hire (the rates are very reasonable, too) so if Hampshire is part of your manor do check out Rivendell Studios. Our model is the unspeakably beautiful Jennifer Dickinson.

Master photographer John Denton is one of my favourite photographers not just because of his visionary work, but also because he is a wonderful teacher. To have value to their students a teacher or mentor needs to instruct, nurture, and inspire in equal measure providing a safe environment free from judgement. I have been on courses in the past where I have felt the urge to sit in the background, because the speaker has managed to instil something akin to a feeling of inadequacy, killing the urge to step forward and actively take part in the shoot. And I can think of many other, often well-qualified photographers who have felt the same way on occasion. If you train with John this will never happen, irrespective of your level of experience.

It should be said at this point that the images I’m about to show you are of course of the nude form. A thing of beauty, as most fine art or people photographers will testify. I am of course here in the UK, where that attitude would generally prevail, but the world is a colourful place and not every jurisdiction will find nudity acceptable. So you will need to bear this in mind before you post your fine art nude imagery on your site or blog. And there is of course a huge difference between artistic nude studies and so-called “glamour” photography which is designed to titillate and arouse – that is NOT what I do. With that in mind the delegates on workshops like this are carefully screened by the lead photographer and it’s vital we’re all working off the same page – someone hoping to get their jollies will be shown the door pretty quickly. As far as posting the finished results go, as I said there may be cultural considerations depending on where you are geographically. I have no reservations whatsoever about posting beautiful fine art figure studies here on my blog under either the Portrait or Boudoir categories. I am a portrait photographer and I photograph human beings extensively, be they business people, or families. If images depicting the nude form were to offend some of my viewers then that would be unusual here in the UK, but if it were the case ultimately I’m of the view that those are not clients who I would necessarily wish to work with anyway. Once you’ve carved your niche in the photographic community, there is some value in staying true to yourself, but once again I stress that if you live in a locality where nude imagery may compromise how you are viewed them good sense dictates that you give careful consideration to whether or not you share your images.

So what is fine art nude photography?  The most influential nude photographers include Man Ray, Helmut Newton, Bill Brandt and the more graphic representations of Irving Penn, Richard Avedon and Annie Liebowitz. As far as the modern day is concerned, and the relationship between fine art nude photography and the portrait photographer, there has been and remains an enduring fascination with this genre, most notably because it is a precise and very demanding discipline to explore and will in many ways push you to your creative limits. This became glaringly obvious as the workshop progressed, the slightest change in the positioning of a limb, the merest alteration of the placement of the lights and the image became something completely different. The concept would either evolve into something uniquely gratifying or else would create some frustration when the picture in the mind of the photographer continues to elude them. This is another area where tutors such as John Denton have such value, each photographer is actively encouraged to explore a concept for themselves so that they will see first-hand how the principles of fine art nude photography can be a constant challenge. For me, this was a particularly interesting exercise. A lot of my subjects are either very young (children) or are understandably very inexperienced in front of the camera (that would be most of us) or else I may be photographing pets, domestic animals, or wildlife. In other words I have had to learn the value of contingency, compromise and several game plans in the face of subjects who cannot always be directed. And suddenly I find myself in a situation where every centimetre of movement matters, every instruction must resonate with the subject, and more importantly fine art nude photography is about freeing the mind of both photographer and subject. In that respect, you will see a distinct progression in the images, from the finely controlled and carefully lit figure studies to the more conceptual forms where movement and blur have been introduced. It’s possible to explore the precise refined beauty of your subject, leading them through to imagery which becomes unleashed and almost primitive. I cannot begin to tell you how exhilarating this can be.

Given that I’m always being asked about my kit, I spent the weekend shooting exclusively with my Olympus OMD EM-5 and occasionally with my Fuji X100 whenever I needed a wider field of view (grabbing this little camera is much easier than wasting time swapping lenses, especially if it’s just for a few frames). The images were captured with natural light, reflectors, and multi-light studio setups using Elinchrom Quadra Ranger lights (available from the Flash Centre here in the UK). Inside the studio I found it very useful to be able to re-frame quickly and so I used the cheap but surprisingly good Oly 14-42 pancake zoom lens (this is a variable aperture zoom but that doesn’t matter when you’re using studio lighting, since you’re normally at a tight aperture anyway). The OMD performed absolutely flawlessly and I cannot find fault with its output, and of course I remained free from the usual aches and pains which go hand-in-hand with carrying big heavy DSLRs!

Before I finally get around to the images, the workshop added further value by including a session on practicalities and legalities, which should never be ignored. Where nude fine art nude photography is concerned a trained professional model will be your greatest ally, since she or he will easily interpret your instructions and will also bring a variety of useful ideas into the mix. They’ll also be well versed with the necessity for a Model Release which sets out your mutual obligations. This is vital, and your model will need to understand that by publishing the images in your portfolio, which is of course what both parties are seeking to achieve, the model needs to be comfortable with the fact that their nude form is something their friends, boyfriends and family are likely to encounter. This is never an issue for a fine art model but will require some explaining if your subject is less experienced. A Release is binding, just as your normal photographic Contracts or Terms are, and a model (let alone her boyfriend or father) does not have the right to contact the photographer at a later date and demand that the pictures are removed from that photographer’s portfolio. A jealous boyfriend, husband or disapproving family member is not the photographer’s problem and no professional photographer should be expected to negate parts of their portfolio for this reason. There is also the matter of how you go about arranging and managing nude shoots. Your models will need reassurance that you’re bone fide therefore evidence of previous photographic sessions along similar lines will be helpful, as well as an established presence as a professional photographer. I am a well qualified member of the leading photographic bodies and am bound by a professional code of conduct at all times, so I would include this and links to my various credentials if a prospective model or client requires it. Some photographers prefer that the model is not accompanied during the actual shoot since an audience can inhibit creative expression, others will allow a friend to accompany the subject should they wish it. Still other photographers will prefer that their own assistant is present to protect them from any possibility of unsavoury allegations. For this reason research becomes important on both sides. As a location photographer I will often Google the names of my clients before fully committing to a shoot, even though the likelihood of encountering anybody unsafe is rare in this country.

What of the final form of the photographs? Quite often the images are destined to be part of a professional model’s portfolio and would therefore be produced as prints for his or her book and digital files for web promotion on the model’s site or agency page. However, like boudoir photography (where the subject is normally clothed in tasteful lingerie or drapes) the images may be commissioned for a private collection as either wall presentations or a fine album.

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Brighton, like many of our more flamboyant seaside towns, has quite a history. It’s well-known for its fabulous Regency architecture and it was in fact home to the Prince Regent. The Brighton Pavilion is a shrine to the opulence and excess of the era. With all of this taken into account it’s no surprise that during the summer Brighton is teeming with both tourists and overseas exchange students who come to study at the many Language Schools dotted around the city. But there were certainly no tourists in evidence today, in fact consistent with the horrific weather we’ve been having over the last few months the temperature was barely above freezing, a bitter wind was blowing in from the east and freezing rain broke out by mid afternoon. This does not bode well for the fashion shoot I have tomorrow outdoors in Hampshire by the river Hamble, or the fine art figure studies I’ll be doing on Sunday, when the current snow blizzards are predicted to get even worse. As I write this I’m rummaging around my office putting aside arctic grade clothing and waterproof boots. It’s not a simple matter of postponing shoots because here in the UK you simply cannot predict if the weather will be any better on a different occasion. Given that we are at the end of March, it really is quite frightening. Normally the weather would be warming up nicely, the birds would be singing and building nests, flowers would be blooming, and fresh new growth would be coming through on all of the trees. I can say that all of those things are completely absent so far.

Anyway, I found myself in town this morning and I decided to visit Brighton Museum. It’s free to get in, it’s warm, it’s beautiful, and the exhibits are extremely interesting if you have leanings towards fashion, textiles, ceramics, and furniture. The building itself is just stunning, inside and out. There are also rooms dedicated to the geographic and geological history of the county, so there really is something for everyone. But personally I love the fashion rooms where you will see outfits from Britain’s most famous fashion designers. Downstairs you’ll see examples of furnishings from Regency times through to the 1970s. As always I had a small camera with me so I grabbed some pictures of what I saw. The museum is rather dark inside (to protect the delicate exhibits from UV degradation) so your camera will need to be capable at fairly high ISO values. You won’t need high shutter speeds of course, because everything is static. I had a fairly cheap (but very good) pancake 14-42 zoom on my EM-5 – this is a fairly slow lens but if you stick to the wide end then you can make use of the widest available aperture of f3.5. I do have fast primes, but none of them are particularly wide so this little zoom is a good choice for general walkabout stuff.

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